ROCKFORD—In October 2000, Augustinian Father Robert Francis Prevost, O.S.A., now newly elected Pope Leo XIV, concelebrated a funeral Mass at St. Bernadette Church in Rockford for John Palmer, father of his friend Father Richard Palmer, O.S.A., who was from the parish and served many years in Peru.
Father Richard’s brother Gerald of St. Bernadette Parish recalls that around a half dozen Augustinian priests concelebrated that Mass for his dad in October 2000, with St. Bernadette pastor, Father John Stringini, presiding.
“They all show up to support (their fellow Augustinians),” Gerald Palmer says, noting that his brother happened to be home when their father died, and that Father Prevost happened to be in Chicago at that time.
“He had so many different things in his life that he did,” Palmer says about the new pope. “This man traveled the world.”
And, he adds, “Yes, he was here.”
